CHICAGO — Bulls forward Luol Deng canned a 20-foot jump shot from the right wing. He finished a three-point play off a feed from Joakim Noah, then sank a floater near the right elbow.

And then he was off, to the game the Bulls have expected him to play these entire playoffs, to a leading role in a 95-83 win over the Atlanta Hawks that pushed his team to a 3-2 lead in this Eastern Conference semifinals series.

Rose has held Chicago’s Batman role all year, and he filled it again Tuesday with 33 points and nine assists. But he needs a Robin, more and more so as the weather gets warm and the basketball intensity heats up, too.

It’s mandatory if the Bulls want to win the franchise’s seventh championship. Michael Jordan’s first mate on the six other title trips, Scottie Pippen, watched Game 5 from courtside. And the performance he and his 22,979 fellow fans watched shows why Deng is the most likely candidate to own that spot this time around.

He thrived on offense, shaking off a charge on the game’s first possession to make four field goals in the game’s opening 4:06. He scored 21 points over the first three quarters and finished with 23 over 46 consistent minutes.

On defense, Deng played even better. Hawks star Joe Johnson never found rhythm and shot 6-of-15. Deng also helped anchor an oddball, defense-heavy fourth-quarter lineup–Rose, plus subs Omer Asik, Taj Gibson and Ronnie Brewer, joined him. Coach Tom Thibodeau played the group almost 11 minutes, and it held the Hawks to 15 points in the pivotal period.

“He left us out there,” Brewer said. “We had to prove it was the right decision.”

Deng made the stretch’s quintessential defensive play at the quarter’s halfway point. Johnson held the ball on the left wing, inches from Thibodeau near the Bulls’ bench. He rose for a 3-pointer, but Deng poked the ball loose, and Johnson fumbled it out of bounds.

Deng pumped both fists after the play, an emotional display once rare but growing more common in the postseason. He showed similar flair in Round 1 against the Pacers, when he drew a Game 1, fourth-quarter technical foul that teammates said sparked a comeback victory.

“I really feel like I’m one of the leaders of this team when I do stuff like that,” Deng said late Tuesday night. “When they guys see it and the crowd sees it, guys will follow. I didn’t do it in the past because most of the time, I was following. I feel like I’m a much better leader now.”

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“He’s a quiet guy, but he’s a competitor, and he has that stuff in him,” McRoberts said of Deng during the first-round series. “When things get tough, he’s going to continue to play hard and try to win. He’s done it all year. It makes him kind of underrated.”

Deng, who started all 82 regular-season games and all 10 playoff games so far, has served as one of the lone constants in Rose’s 2010-11 cast. Noah and Carlos Boozer each missed extended stretches with injuries. Others took game-by-game turns helping the MVP—Keith Bogans (11 points, 3-of-5 3-point shooting) and Gibson (11 fourth-quarter points) took cracks in Game 5.

Deng, though, stood out above all. Early and late, his offense, defense and feelings showed on the floor Tuesday night.

“He has so many intangibles that lead you to winning,” Thibodeau said. “We like to keep him on the floor as much as possible.”

The leaning on Deng will continue, just as those early Bulls looked to Pippen as Jordan’s primary wingman in the '90s. If he continues to excel, this year’s team will approach, and maybe reach, an NBA championship, too.